Perfect Strangers
by tartan robes
Summary: AU. If Elsie Hughes had married Joe Burns, if Charles Carson had remained a Cheerful Charlie, and if they had met all the same.
1. Chapter 1

Joe Burns doesn't ask any questions.

He says, "If you need a place, you can stay with us - so long as you pull your own weight."

So Charles Carson says yes, out of desperation and not desire. Out of the need to be anywhere but the stage, the need to be as far away from Grigg, from that life, as possible.

And Grigg won't find him out here; that much he's sure of.

"We've been needing an extra hand around the place," Joe talks to himself, to Charles, to sky on the way back, "since the baby and all."

Charles stares at his feet, doesn't ask any questions.

* * *

><p>He ducks to get in the front door.<p>

"Elsie!" Joe is animated, fills the room with sound and smiles, "You'll never guess what I picked up in town!"

"Something useful I -"

The woman stops when she turns the corner, her eyes resting on the giant slumped in the middle of the room. "Oh," she says, bouncing the infant slightly in her arms, "hello."

He stares at her for too long. He had thought himself perhaps a bit older than Joe, but he has at least fives years on her. At least five inches as well. She walks towards him, extends a hand. All the while, neither look away.

She holds his hand for too long. In spite of herself, marvels at how smooth his skin is. There are no callouses, no cuts, no blemishes.

"Elsie Hu –" She pauses, "Elsie Burns. It's very nice to meet you, Mister –?"

"Carson," he mumbles.

She doesn't let go of his hand. Not yet.

Joe takes the baby from her other arm, and he notices her relax considerately; worry leaves her. He lifts the child in the air. "And this," Joe beams, "is Peter."

"You'll be a farmhand?" Elsie asks.

He nods, slowly.

Her hand slips out of his. "You'll ruin your hands if you stay here," she mutters and then she looks away, to Joe, "Another seat at the table, then?"

* * *

><p>"You haven't done farm work before, have you?" She says at dinner.<p>

He shakes his head.

"But he looks as though he was built for it, don't he?" Joe chimes in, grinning.

Elsie only nods, lips pursed.

"Then, tell me, Mister Carson, what exactly did you do?"

"Nothing worthwhile," he shifts the food on his plate, avoids her stare.

"Well," Joe says, "that'll all change tomorrow!"

"I certainly hope so," he manages a smile, "Mister Burns."

* * *

><p>He knows it's wrong to eavesdrop, but as he unpacks what little he has, he hears her voice down the hall.<p>

"It'll be nice," he hears her whisper, "to have someone else in the house."

He tiptoes down the hall, steps trained to be light, catches a glimpse of her sitting, Peter on her lap.

"Gets awfully lonely just the three of us," she continues. "I was never this lonely as a maid, you know? There was never any time to be lonely. But now," a sigh, "well now I'm talking to _you_."

She bounces him slightly on her knee, listens to him laugh.

"I worry sometimes," she says, "worry I'm not cut out to be a mother – heaven knows why I'm telling you this. You don't even understand a word I say."

"But I don't like to be held, I don't like to hold –"

She lifts him up, lays him down in his crib.

"I could have been a housekeeper, you know. Maybe not now, but eventually, with time."

Her thumb ghosts above the boy's eyes.

"Enough of this, though," she forces a smile, "_you_ need to sleep now."

Charles Carson pivots carefully, creeps back into his room.

* * *

><p>Later, she knocks on his door.<p>

"Can I help you with anything, Mister Carson?"

"No Missus Burns, I'm more thank comfortable, thank you."

"Ah," she nods, opens the door, but hesitates at the handle.

"You won't lie to me, Mister Carson," she says.

"I beg your pardon, Missus Burns?"

"You were on the stage. I saw you once, not a proper show, but I know who the _Charlies _are."

"Ah," he says, studying the lines in his hands.

"I don't mind hosting you, Mister Carson, but I do mind liars."

"If I may, Missus Burns," he says, looking her in the eye, finally, "I did not – exactly – lie."

"And this," she says, smiling slightly, " was not – exactly – a warning."

The door snaps soundly behind her.

* * *

><p>Under the covers, she feels his hands slide down her waist, pull her close.<p>

"_Joe._"

"Elsie?"

"I have to get up tomorrow," she says, staring at the wall.

"So do I," his breath is in her ear, she can feel him smiling into her neck.

She turns, winds her way into his arms. Their noses brush, he sees a flash of teeth, a grin.

"But I have to get up _before_ you."

His hands skim lower, press down below her hips. She gasps slightly, and as he shifts to hover over her, protests: "Your breakfast will be late."

He kisses her below her jaw, "I'll forgive you."

"We have a _guest_."

"He'll forgive you too." His lips trail farther down.

Her breath catches, head falls back against her pillow, eyes close.

All the while, she pretends his hands are smooth.

* * *

><p>Afterwards, his head on her breast, she listens to him snore softly, runs her fingers along the side of face.<p>

One of her hands finds his, sandpaper moves against itself. She closes her eyes again, flinches out of guilt.

_I'll forgive you_, he had breathed.

_I'll forgive you_, his hands had spelled against her skin.

She leans in, kisses the top of his head.

"I know you will," she whispers, "you always will."

* * *

><p><em>I'm just churning out mediocrity this week. I should finish the various things I've started, but instead I'm dabbling in this. Many historical accuracies will probably be ahead, as a warning. I really have no idea how farms operate now, let alone then. And this chapter is kind of mundane, but hopefully things will pick up soon.<br>_


	2. Chapter 2

She wakes up and the house is still. Joe's hands are still wrapped around her waist, his body bent along hers. Gently, she removes herself from him; though used to his presence, the warmth of his skin is still unnerving. She blames it, mostly, on her need for organization. On the way the papers go here and you fold letters and place them there and this compartment is for photos only. In the way that she sleeps on this side of the bed and he sleeps on the other and there is - there must be - a line between them. There is a point where the landscape surely breaks, where she ends and he begins. Sometimes, of course, the plates shift and she meets him, but in the morning she expects things to be right. Things are always better in the morning, normal in the morning.

And things are, she tells herself, once she has positioned Joe back on his side of the bed (his smile, sleepy and soft, doesn't change as she moves him), normal. She is up at the normal time; she has the same chores to do. She stands in the darkness, shakes at the skirt of her nightdress, as if trying to remove something, anything, but there's nothing caught in the fabric. Her husband is still sleeping in their bed, as always. There is a visitor sleeping, surely, down the hall. (This fact, of course, is not normal. but she expects it to be a normality; she has already scheduled in a place for him in the timetable of her mind.) And the baby is sleeping soundly. In the darkness, she runs the comb through her hair. She no longer has a need to see her face; she doesn't think it matters. Normal, planned, predictable - just as it should be.

When she walks down the stairs, she is silent. Ever mindful of her sleeping boys and forever a housemaid - the invisible, shadow of a servant - at heart. Some habits are trained, impossible to forget. She lights the kitchen stove.

* * *

><p>Halfway through cooking breakfast, he joins her in the kitchen. He being their guest, Mister Carson, not Joe. Joe she knows. She can plan around Joe, for Joe. Not for Mister Carson, not yet.<p>

"You could get another thirty minutes of sleep in," she says, casting him a glance. He's standing, rigid, on the other side of the table. He's a peculiar man if she's ever met one. She would have expected a showman to more relaxed, but it seems Charles Carson is a stranger to comfort.

"I've been up," he says simply, "for a good hour now."

Her mind registers, barely, that this means they woke up at the same time.

Perhaps, she muses, planning around Mister Carson won't be so difficult.

"Is there," he continues, clearly unsettled by the pause, the absence, "anything I can help you with, Missus Burns?"

Planning for him may prove to be easy, but putting him to work, she is sure, will be even more so.

* * *

><p>After breakfast, they head out. It has, Charles Carson realizes, been quite a long time since he's had a morning. Of the stage, he can remember only the night: the darkness of the crowd before the lights come on, the dim light of the pub, stumbling along streets at midnight, and the endless, thick haze of smoke. This, on the other hand, feels good. The sun is just appearing behind the house, but the air feels bright, if that's possible. Things are lighter somehow, the weight lessened.<p>

Perhaps it's the company.

Beside him, Joe is all smiles and laughter. He's not sure he's seen Elsie Burns smile yet, not properly. She's been only piercing glances and sharp lines, but her husband contrasts her severity, her seriousness. It makes him wonder how they fit together. Perhaps they balance one another out; that must be it. He cannot imagine them snapping together soundly like a puzzle. No, there must be something in his nature that brings out the best in her. And she, surely, brings out the best in him. That must be it.

Ahead of him he can see shadowed pillars, a fence branching off into the horizon. That's another quality he likes about this place: the skyline, the sense of distance.

He says, "She's Scottish." Blunders over the words, berates himself for being so blunt. That was not how he meant to start a conversation, not at all.

But Joe only chuckles, "Did you only notice now?"

Charles decides silence is better than another mistake; Joe fills the emptiness.

"Yes, she's certainly a long way from home."

"What's brought her here, then?"

"Here, here? I can't tell you. I'm just as surprised as you are, I'm sure, that she wakes up next to me every morning -"

"I never meant to imply anything, Mister Burns, I just -"

"- I wasn't sure she wanted to come back to farming. Certainly, I wanted her too. She's good for this life, practical. Lord knows," he grins, "I couldn't run this place without her."

Injecting, speaking even, seems useless at this point. Joe Burns is content to talk, with or without a listening audience.

"I suppose she saw something in this life that she fancied. I like to believe it was me, at least in part, but," Joe shakes his head, though his smile never wavers, "I won't flatter myself so. You just get on with your work and hope she's content."

"You just hope this place becomes home, no matter how you pronounce the word," he concludes.

* * *

><p>Joe is with Peter and so he wanders into the kitchen, finds her there, sweeping the floor.<p>

"Evening, Mister Carson," she says simply, not looking up.

"You walk," she continues by way of explanation, answering the question that he didn't know how to ask, "much lighter than my husband."

She sets down the broom, motions for him to sit. "You can breathe in my house, Mister Carson," she says, setting out two glasses. "This is going to be your home for a little while now, is it not?" She pours wine into the cups, "I'd like you to feel comfortable at the very least."

In response, he only sits up straighter in his chair. She sighs, under her breath, hands him a glass. Their cups meet, clink delicately. "I do believe you deserve this," her mouth twitches, almost a smile, but not quite.

And then there is silence. But she notes how his shoulders slacken slightly, how he adjusts to it. The pause between them isn't strained or tense or pressing. It seems, if anything, rather natural.

"Why don't you tell me something, Mister Carson." It is not a question or a suggestion, but more of an order.

"I don't have much to tell."

"No dazzling exploits from your past life?"

He is, suddenly, fascinated by the notches on the dinner table and the colour of his wine.

She catches herself before she sighs, "Perhaps not a past life, but a current one. Can't you tell me about yourself, Mister Carson?"

"My father farmed too," he says, and though his voice is slow, there is something sudden about the phrase.

"It doesn't look as though you did much farm work," she says. He's not certain, but perhaps she is teasing him.

"No, there were always," a pause, a tug at the collar, "distractions."

The conversation becomes a distraction in itself, stretching out as far and as long as the country horizon.

Before their glasses are empty and he finally bids her goodnight, he is certain he has seen her smile, properly.

* * *

><p>He insists on waking up earlier in the mornings. They fall into their own rhythm, work together as they wait for the sun to rise.<p>

And suns do rise and then set and then cycle through it all over again. By sunrise, she finds herself growing accustom to his unspoken stubbornness, to his eye for detail, his perfectionism. By sunset, she falls back into bed with Joe. Joe who laughs in his sleep and insists, always, that things will be all right.

She wonders, briefly, how did morning become so different from nightfall?

* * *

><p>Every so often, the town nearby holds a dance or two.<p>

"Shall we go dancing, darling?" Joe asks, taking her hand pulling her close.

"And who would look after the baby?"

"Perhaps Charles could."

"I'm perfectly capable -"

"Of dancing."

He presses his forehead against hers, smiles at her, practically pleads.

She smiles back, but rests her hand on his chest, stalls.

"Not tonight."

And then, as she pulls away, "But you should go. Have some fun."

Charles Carson walks into the room then or perhaps he has been there all along. She can't tell; he steps soundlessly.

"Coming with me?" Joe asks the taller man.

But the only reply he gets is a small shake of the head. "No," Charles says, "I don't care much for dancing."

He sees, out of the corner of his eye, Elsie Burns purse her lips again.

* * *

><p>After they have consumed more wine (it was only natural to sit again at that dinner table, to talk, to – for the briefest of moments – laugh together), they find themselves leaning over Peter's cradle, watching the baby sleep.<p>

"He's a very handsome boy," Charles finally manages, thinking it the proper thing to say.

"Yes," Elsie replies, "he's fortunate enough to look more like his father than me."

"He has your eyes."

There is a pause. In the lapse, Peter's eyes – Elsie's eyes – close and baby begins to fall asleep.

"When will Mister Burns be back?"

"When his feet are sore."

"Do the two of you dance much, then?"

"Not very much. I'm rather poor at it."

"I'm sure that's not the case, Missus Burns."

"Oh, Mister Carson, I assure you it is."

"I'm certain you dance perfectly adequately."

And perhaps she shouldn't, no certainly she shouldn't, but she is determined to see him dance and more determined to win this tiny argument. She grabs his hand suddenly, says, "I'll show you, Mr. Carson. I really am rubbish at dancing." He doesn't protest as she moves his other to her waist. Perhaps this is a bad idea. He is terribly close now, so close she can't bring herself to look up at his face. The distance, in the dim light of her child's bedroom, is rather intimate. But it doesn't bother her, not like in the mornings with Joe. It's not overwhelming, overbearing. It just fits. His hand is large enough to swallow hers whole and yet, somehow, it just fits. She stares at their feet for a moment after. "See?" She finally says, still not looking up, "I don't even know how to start."

His hand tightens around hers, briefly, and he steps forward, guiding her. "I believe the man usually leads anyway, Missus Burns."

And then they are dancing. Maybe not well – she certainly isn't – but she can't believe it matters. He is leading her across the floorboards. Perhaps they are not elegant, but there is something simple in the movements, second nature. She realizes she has come back to those words, time and time again, when she tries to describe her times with Mister Carson. Before she can think more on this, she hears the music. It's soft, barely there. So quiet she wonders if she's delusional from the dancing or if she's gone insane, but no, it's steady, present. It's him. Of course it's him, the shadow of his voice filling the room. It pulls her closer to him, beckons her eyes to close. How easy, she thinks, how natural it would be to rest her head against his chest. She's tired enough for it, certainly.

But that, that is not even a _maybe _mistake. That is clearly wrong.

There are lines you just cannot cross.

His song becomes louder and so she finally looks up at him. His eyes are closed; he is elsewhere, though where she cannot fathom. Of course, of course he is elsewhere. She should be elsewhere too. (The heat of Joe, pressed against her side, flashes back to her. That is where she should be.) He wouldn't, of course, of course, sing knowingly. Not when he's spend so long bottling it all in. The notes become clearer and, in an instant, he's lifting her up – spinning her around in the air.

She gasps, then laughs, the room, everything, circling around her. In the midst of it all, their eyes finally meet. The music stops. With a slight thud he lowers her, just as suddenly, down to the ground.

"I thought you weren't fond of dancing," she comments, breathless.

And then he makes _that look_. She had seen it in their mornings, light streaming in through the window. The way his jaw clenches, his eyes dart away. The way he looks absolutely, completely caught. And she supposes he is. Caught somewhere between the person he was, the showman he was trying to cast aside, and this new identity he building for himself, all the blocks perfectly straight, perfectly in place. She rubs at her wrist carefully, bites her lip. How inconsiderate of her to go digging through the grave he's dug. She studies his face again, tries to imagine the words he wants to say, but won't. In the end, his mouth only twitches and then, with a nod, he leaves the room.

She closes her hand around her wrist, sighs.

* * *

><p>Joe comes home late, smelling of one drink too many. He stumbles through the door, into the kitchen where she was waiting for him, clocking the seconds only to rearrange the timetable in her mind, not out of worry or longing or fear. She trusts Joe; she trusts herself. Perhaps a part of her, too, knew that he would need help crawling into their bed tonight. So she takes his hand, leads him under the covers.<p>

"Have fun tonight?" She asks, rhetorical.

He answers anyway, mind still blurry, "Yes, yes, yes."

And then, as she pulling the covers over the two of them, he says, "And you, love?"

In the darkness, he doesn't see her smile. He only hears the silence.

* * *

><p>She wakes up – earlier than planned – to the sound of Peter crying.<p>

The covers are thrown aside, her feet drag across the room. But she stops next to the doorframe, presses herself against the wall instead.

She can see Mister Carson's silhouette. When she squints, she sees her child in his hands. She can hear him, too, whisper into Peter's ear.

"You really shouldn't cry," he's saying, "your mother will get no rest."

"And she needs all the rest she can get. Deserves it all too."

But Peter can't hear a word the man says, too caught up in his own screams. She thinks of entering then, flattered by the efforts but, really, this is her duty to her son, to her house. Crying infants are just another part of the job.

"You really must be quiet," he tries again. She can see his shoulders shift, uncomfortable.

And then, finally, "A song, then? I don't know many appropriate for a _young _gentleman such as yourself, but –" He holds the boy a little tighter, mumbles, "Maybe one your mother would approve of."

Elsie Burns' fingers tighten around the doorframe. She holds her breath, doesn't dare move except to lean in, slightly, listen closer. Faintly, barely, she hears, "_There is a ship and she sails the sea, she's loaded deep as deep can be, but not so deep as the love I'm in, I know not if I sink or swim_–"

And then the crying lulls, stops; Peter slumps against Charles Carson's shoulders, still.

Elsie Hughes pivots quickly, slips back into her bed without a sound.

* * *

><p><em>I've been neglecting all of my silly stories here, so I thought I'd remedy that with this, uh, more monstrous update. I'm not completely happy with it, but I thought I should update something, so here you are.<br>_


	3. Chapter 3

And then there is work. There's work and Joe loves it because it's all he's ever known. There's work and Charles dedicates himself to it because it gives him purpose, because when his fingers bleed and his legs ache, he knows he's someone better. And Elsie throws herself into it, always, because she needs it, because work keeps her busy.

But it doesn't keep her company.

* * *

><p>Once, on one of their early mornings, he says, "Do you ever get tire of all this?" He means waking up before the sun, lighting stove after stove. He means making breakfast, sweeping the floors. He means everything, all of it.<p>

"I tend to find," she replies, "that being tired is best part of it all."

"Besides," she adds, "sometimes you've got to take care of people, Mister Carson," she adjusts the flowers on the table. "You may not want to, but you've got to. It's just the way things work."

Her fingers run through the petals. Dead. Every single flower in the vase is wilted and overturned, but it hardly matters. (She has never considered herself a beautiful woman - only a capable one. And so, what need does she have for beautiful things? Dead or not, the flowers still serve their purpose. And isn't that the most important thing? Purpose? She looks him in the eye. It has to be. It must be.)

"And what about you?" He looks out the window as he speaks, as if averting his eyes will make the question less forward, intrusive. (He's fooling himself now, but he's been doing it for so long he tells himself once more won't hurt.) "Who takes care of Elsie Burns?"

"I take care of Elsie Burns, Mister Carson."

She says it as though it's the most obvious fact in the world.

And maybe, maybe it is.

* * *

><p>How is it that they end up falling into step together? She doesn't know, doesn't want to begin to understand. Somehow, somehow, they are walking to the village together. Behind them, her family, her <em>home<em>, grows smaller and smaller and smaller. Before them, there is green and blue and the shadowed peaks of houses – bright but distant. And all around them there are flowers, small flecks of yellow and purple in the earth.

She says, "When I was a girl, the boys used to pick these for the ones they thought they fancied." _Thought they fancied _because who knows what you really want at that age? Who knows what you really want at any age? There's a ring around her finger; she wanted it once, but now? Who can say? Who knows a single thing?

For his part, he thinks of the bouquet on the dining table – and all its faded leaves. "Did Mister Burns bring you flowers, then?"

She laughs. Is this the second or third time? He can't remember and berates himself for it. He _should _remember. She looks at him out the corner of her eye, "Goodness no! When I met Joe I didn't want to be a girl anymore, Mister Carson. I wanted to be a woman." A pause, their steps slow. She throws a glance over her shoulder, anchoring herself back to her house, to Joe, to Peter. "I wanted to be a woman and everything I thought came with it."

"And now?" His voice is barely there; he knows he's toeing their lines.

"What does it matter?" She finally says, sighing, her pace suddenly quicker, "What does it matter what I _want _now? Who does what they _want_? Who _knows_ what they want?"

He's gone silent again; her only company is the sound of their shoes against the dirt and dust.

"You lock yourself in, Mister Carson. You make your choices when you're young and you hope you make the right ones. You take the good you have then and, if you're lucky, the goodness stays. That's all you can hope for, Mister Carson."

She bites her lip, "It's all you can ever get."

Around them, the flowers bend in the wind.

* * *

><p>The next morning, Charles Carson is nowhere to be found. She doesn't allow herself to feel – feel what? – any disappointment. That would be wrong, so very wrong.<p>

Charles Carson claims he woke up late that morning, but there are flowers in the vase. Bright purple and yellow and full of life.

"Those are pretty," Joe says at breakfast.

"Yes," she agrees, "yes they are."

* * *

><p>She's staring at the ceiling – again.<p>

"Anything interesting up there?" Joe asks her, smiling. His hand finds hers under the covers.

She shakes her head, refuses to look him in the eye.

"Elsie, are you all right?"

His fingers squeeze hers, but the only response he gets is a flash of her teeth digging into her bottom lip and the sound of a sigh, heavy, troubled.

"_Elsie_." And so he pulls her close to him, wraps his arms around her. She turns her head, rests it against his chest. For a moment, there is just the two of breathing – in and out, in and out – before he thinks he hears her sob. He must be mistaken. In all his years, after all they've been through, he's never once seen her cry. Instinctively, he holds her tighter.

"You're a good man, Joe Burns," she speaks, face still buried against his chest.

"But we've always known you're the better one," he whispers in her ear. And then sighs, out of relief, when he hears her laugh.

In the dark, Elsie Burns dries her eyes.

_You're the better one. _

But is she, really?

* * *

><p>On three separate nights, the three of them hold Peter.<p>

His father throws him in the air, and when the child doesn't so much as scream, says, "That's your mother's spirit there."

The guest holds the child in his long arms, fixated on his eyes. When the child laughs, he says, "Your father's temperament – though I cannot relate to it – will serve you well." The boy grins wider and so he adds, "It will balance out your mother's mind."

His mother holds him closer, tighter. She doesn't need to – he's already asleep, but those are the moments when she holds him closest, when she feels most comfortable with her son. "I hope," she whispers, "I hope you grow up to be nothing like me."

Her knees meet the floorboards; there's a draft in the room and not one lamp is on. Elsie Burns holds her son closer, wills herself not to cry.

"I hope," she says, "you'll be better. So much better."

* * *

><p>"How about tonight?" He asks, insistent, his hand tightly wound around hers.<p>

"I can't Joe. You know I can't. There's Peter and –"

"I can look after Peter," Charles Carson's voice comes from the far corner of the room. Elsie Burns pivots quickly – Joe's hand still holding her to him. She looks at him carefully, brows raised. Charles face is void of any feeling. There is only duty, servitude.

"See?" Joe grins.

"I don't –"

"You should go," Charles speaks again, insists, "have some fun."

Joe's hand ties her to him, pulls her out the door.

* * *

><p>Pressed between couples, drowning in the smell of smoke and alcohol, he holds her ever closer.<p>

"I'm not going anywhere, Joe," she smiles at him.

"I know you're not. It was hard enough getting you out of the house."

"Well, you know how I feel about dancing."

They're spinning, feet moving in a blur of forwards and backwards and nowheres.

"I know what you think of it," Joe nods, "I just wonder when you got so good at it."

He twirls her across the room, not caring about how many couples break apart because of it, shriek and scream. It all slurs into meaningless noise. The only words that matter to him, that have ever mattered to him, are the ones she says.

There are silhouettes melting into shadows and fragments of faces and grins, but all she can see, all she can see clearly, is his face.

For the first time in a long time, a very long time, it's just the two of them.

* * *

><p>Charles Carson watches them, from that corner of the room, come in through the door.<p>

They come in laughing; Joe's movements are tipsy and they spill through the door frame suddenly, together. And then Joe's hands are pressing against her waist and she's smiling into his neck. He pushes her, gently, dizzily, against the wall. The door is still open and the night air cold, but Charles knows they can't feel any of that chill. Joe kisses her then, soundly and easily, her hands around his neck and her back against the wall.

Charles Carson leaves the room, silent as always, before she opens her eyes, has an opportunity to see him.

He doesn't want to know.

He already knows.


	4. Chapter 4

Joe didn't lift her up into the air while they were dancing, not like Charles did. But that night he does; he lifts her up and draws her close. There's no music this time, no humming, just the sound of them. Their breath and the arch of her spine and the feeling of his hands – rough, always so rough. Perhaps there's nothing remarkable about the moment. She can only use old words to describe the feeling. There's nothing new. But tonight Joe is warm and tonight, every night, Joe is familiar. Tonight, if there is nothing else, there is comfort. There is _somethin_g. He falls asleep with his arms around her again. This time, she faces, him, chin leaning against his shoulders, eyes wide awake. She's exhausted, so exhausted, but she can't sleep. She pulls back then, rubs her fingers against the skin and stubble. If he feels anything, he doesn't react. His heart is, perhaps, too seeped in sleep.

She sighs, reaches behind her and unclasps his hands, slips free. If he feels anything, if he notes the absence, he doesn't stir, only continues to sleep.

And then she's walking. Walking over floorboards that creak and announce her arrival, walking away from Joe, past Peter, walking to his door. His door. When did it become his door? Weeks – or it months now – it was her door. All the doors here were hers; this house was hers. Now? Now she doesn't know a single thing.

So she doesn't know why she pushes that door open.

Maybe she wants to see him sleep. See him sleep and see if he sleeps like Joe, see him sleep and – She doesn't know. She'll never know.

Because he's awake. He's sitting upright, legs hanging off the side of his bed, back against the wall, staring into his palms. Light, light from the door, from her, rushes in, catches the lines and wrinkles in his palms. He looks up.

"Couldn't sleep," she finally says. She's not sure if it was supposed to be a question for him or statement about herself, but it sums them both up and so no one says anything further. She should apologize, she knows. This isn't proper. This isn't how thing are done. This is_ wrong_.

He's tense and he's stunned; she can see that much. He's not much more than a statue, but – Lord help her, what on earth is she doing – when she holds out her hand, he takes it, guides her down next to him. She eases herself back, reclines against the wall, next to him. Her feet barely hang off the bed.

She feels so small tonight. Maybe it's the lengths of their legs or the sizes of their feet or the way, even sitting, she still has to look up, slightly, to meet his gaze. Or maybe it's that she's in his room. (A room that was once hers.) She's in his room with her hair in an utter mess and the buttons on her nightdress aren't done up properly and – good god, what is she doing? What he must think of her. Knowing is one thing, seeing her now, the aftermath and the mess, that's entirely different.

But he hasn't let go of her hand. If anything, he may be holding it tighter. She feels so small tonight, so fragile. It's an unfamiliar feeling; she resents it immediately. But before she can think further, dissolve into the stillness, she leans against his shoulder, into him. She can't imagine what he must think of her – she's not even sure what she thinks of herself now – but she looks at him anyway. And that's what it is for a while. Her against him, his hand collapsed over hers, eyes meeting. He brushes some of her hair back behind her ear, tries to right the chaos. It doesn't make her look any less vulnerable. _Vulernable_. How she hates the word, loathes the feeling. (But it's all, she realizes, she's been lately.)

"Don't cry," he says suddenly, his voice hoarse. He barely knows what to do now; he won't know what to do if she cries. What he'd be allowed to do. And she nods in response, her nose and lips pressed into his arm, promises that she won't.

They don't say anything else. The house is still and his room is dark and there are her feet, cold and shaking, an impossible distance away.

They fall asleep like that.

When she wakes up – the same time, always the same time – she's half surprised his eyes aren't opening either. She'd convinced herself that they woke up in unison, down the hall or not. Somehow, it had seemed logical then. Fantasies, all of it. Slowly, she removes her head from his shoulder and her hand from his and stands, uncertain, in the morning dark.

She stands for what feels like forever, testing her balance and the steadiness of the floor. And her hands – hands that traced Joe's kind, oblivious face, hands that held his throughout the night – pull at the skirt of her nightdress (buttons still not done up right) once more, trying to shake that invisible something off from the fabric.

This time, what's caught won't come out.

* * *

><p><em>Ugh, thank you all so much for all the lovely reviews! I really, obviously, can't say how much I appreciate them all! <em>


	5. Chapter 5

He comes down in the morning and for a moment they stand on opposite sides of the table, suspended. The light collects on the flowers. _His _flowers. Or are they hers? She can't remember what she owns anymore. Her kitchen, her home, her family, her heart – does any of it still belongs to her? (And how much of it is shared?)

There's dust around the petals; she can see it in the orange light. Morning runs over the wood, through the vase, splinters out in all directions, touches her. (Does she own anything at all?) She reaches out to brush the dust aside. She's never been fond of it, never been able to leave a room messy.

Her hand finds his already skimming the leaves, blowing the dirt away. And then it's their hands, not just their bodies, that hang frozen in the air. She can still see the sleep in his eyes, feel the memory of his shoulder against hers.

"Did you sleep well, Missus Burns?" He asks.

In response, she takes his hand again. Still warm.

Across the table, she holds it tightly. The feelings inside her, all of it, cuts loose and flies away. She weighs less. The guilt begins to evaporate.

Across the table, in yellow light, he smiles at her.

* * *

><p>Sometimes, when she chops vegetables or her broom hits the ground for the hundredth time, she thinks of what would happen if they just left. He wouldn't go back to the stage and she wouldn't go back to a farm, but she's certain they would have something. They would have planned out something marvelous, something practical.<p>

She's never been one to imagine things, truly. It was never in her nature. But in her mind she sees the two of them, walking to the village. The road stretches, endless, before them and the flowers – their yellow and purple – surrounds them.

She just can't see the end.

* * *

><p>The village buzzes.<p>

_Did you hear?_ The women whisper, tipping their hats to the right. _Did you hear about Miss Watson? Went to bed with Richard Harting, though she wasn't his bride-to-be.  
><em>  
><em>Did you hear? <em>The men chuckle, glancing at their pocket watches. _What a stupid girl she was._ (_Though_, they add in the backs of alleyways and when heads are turned, _Harting's a lucky bastard, he is._)_  
><em>  
><em>A vile girl,<em> the mothers agree. _The sinful sort.  
><em>  
><em>But you'd never do that me, would you darling? <em>The husbands laugh, squeeze their wives' arms a little tighter.

_Of course not,_ the ladies say. _People would talk._

People _would_ talk.

* * *

><p>He finds her in Peter's room, sitting neatly with him in her lap. The boy's fingers reach for her hair.<p>

"Careful," she whispers to her son, catching his fingers with hers instead. His hands, she realizes, are soft as well. (Of course they are, she scolds herself, what could a child do to ruin his?)

Charles Carson stands in the doorway, unable to enter. It just wouldn't be right. He doesn't know why, but he feels it to be true.

She looks up, finds his eyes.

"I've tried so hard to be proper, Mister Carson," she says, voice trembling. "So very hard."

And he can only nod.

"Me too."

* * *

><p>She's slicing the vegetables, Charles is setting the table, and Joe is spinning Peter in the air. This is normalcy now. The pieces don't quiet fit, some of the edges run up and poke into each other, bend and fold and hurt. But, overall, it can't be, it isn't that bad. Her son is laughing, her husband is laughing, her – and Charles Carson is there, standing behind her. The pieces don't quite fit, but she doesn't have to push them in yet, and so it's nice. It's something she could get used to. Or maybe she already has.<p>

And then the door swings open.

A man – short, stout, and red-faced – pokes his head in and then laughs, tremendously and loudly.

"Didn't think you'd end up _here_ of all places, Charlie."

Charles Carson has dropped the knife in his hands. It tumbles to the ground, clangs against the floor. In the little man's shadow, the giant stands very still, frozen.

"Hello," Joe says brightly, catching Peter effortlessly in his arms, "who would you be?"

The man grins, "Grigg, Charles Grigg. I'm his partner."

"Partner?" Joe says, looking from one man to the other. The pieces don't quiet fit.

"We perform together," Grigg continues. "On the stage."

"The stage?"

Charles Carson hasn't moved an inch. From the corner of her eye, Elsie hasn't stopped watching him. She bites down on her lip.

"Well, I'm sure this has been fun, Charlie. But you can't hide out here forever! We have things to do, you know."

Nobody moves.

"_Charlie _–"

She slams her knife down through the wood.

"Mister Grigg, I think it's time for you to leave."

"That's sweet of you, doll, but I really –"

"_Mister Grigg._"

It might be the way she's pointing the knife, it might be the tone of her voice, or even the look in her eye. Either way, Grigg takes a step backwards, easing himself out the door.

"You can't hide out here forever, Charlie."

They eat in silence. Though Charles doesn't eat at all.

"Peculiar fellow," Joe mutters under his breath.

* * *

><p>She should have known it wouldn't last. <p>

* * *

><p><em>This is a sort of lacklustre chapter, but the next one will be better, I promise. And more prompt. And thank you, again, for all your kind reviews. <em>


	6. Chapter 6

Joe Burns is many things, but he is not a stupid man.

Charles Carson doesn't look up or say a word. None of them do. But he can see Elsie bite her lip, see the way she doesn't, not for one moment, stop looking at him. At Charles. Joe Burns is many things, but he is not a blind man either.

Somewhere along the table, lines are cracking, an earthquake splitting them in two.

What he doesn't know is which side she's on.

* * *

><p>It occurs to him, all those days they've spent together in the field, all the days in sweat or rain or cold – he never really knew Charles Carson. A hard worker, the kind of man too absorbed in his work to laugh or smile, a perfectionist. Agreeable enough, likable sure – but did he know him? Really know him?<p>

He doesn't want to think this way, doesn't want to jump to any conclusion, but he can't help but wonder what he wife knows about Mister Carson.

* * *

><p>She finds him in his room, packing what little he owns. It's strange to see it all, neat and compressed, folded into almost nothing. How do you bend a room, a house, a heart? How do you carry that, any of that, with you?<p>

He doesn't look up and so she sits down at the foot of the bed, facing the door. She closes her eyes and then there's only the sound of things getting smaller, fading away.

And then silence. The bed dips and she feels his knee against hers.

"You don't have to go." Because what can that man, that tiny little man do? He doesn't have to go anywhere. Her fingers stumble blindly, grab his hand; he doesn't have to go.

It hurts – not in physical pain, but in emptiness – to sit. The nothingness behind her and the nothingness in front, it's suffocating. She falls back into the bed, breathes out. Vaguely, she's aware of him landing beside her. The bed sinks farther and she wonders if, beneath all the blankets and sheets, she'll drown. His weight, his size, all the things she noticed the night before, it all upsets her now. A man so tall will leave a space just as large when he leaves. And how, how on earth can she ever be expected to close that gap?

She opens her eyes, turns into his arms. Her fingers comb the side of his face, barely there. Already, he's barely there. (Or maybe it's just her.) She says, noses almost touching and his chest against hers, feeling him breathe, "Would you stay?"

Would stay if – what? She doesn't know. The conditions don't matter. She's not sure what she'd compromise. In the back of her mind, she feels Joe's hands on her hips, Peter's fingers curled around hers –Charles Carson's hands hover over her waist and she's thankful for it. She doesn't want to think of anyone else now. Not yet.

_Would you stay?_

When he's still, mouth clammed shut, she presses her lips against his cheek. Pulling away stings, the same gripping emptiness. _Would you?_

"Would you leave?"

His hands rest, timidly, on her and hers slide up his chest, head resting below his chin.

Would she leave? She thinks of Joe again. His face when they got married and his face, again, when he came in, arm bleeding furiously, that summer evening. Both times, he had been smiling. But she had known Joe then, knows him still, and she had seen the way he had fought back tears. And Peter floats back into her mind too. His tiny face and all of Joe's features. Joe's features, but her eyes. The times he's laughed in her arms and cried at night. The times he's grabbed, aimless but determined, at her hand, held her stronger than she's ever held him.

She can feel the roots in the ground – the guilt, the duty – pulling her under. She presses her forehead into his shoulder, hands digging into his chest.

"It's like you've said Missus Burns, " he whispers in her ear. His breath is warm; his body is warm. He's surrounding her now, his limbs and words and heart, and all she can do is try to bury himself in deeper. If she goes far enough, maybe she won't come out. She notices, as an afterthought, the tremour in his voice. "You lock yourself in early and hope it's the right choice." She feels the roots twisting around her legs, holds him tighter, holds him until there's nothing between them – nothing but rules and circumstance. "And that's all you get. All you can hope for."

"I hate it," she says suddenly, her own voice steady despite the way her hands are shaking, violent.

"I know."

She hopes he won't let go.

* * *

><p>But eventually they do. he goes back to packing and she returns downstairs. She's swept this morning, but she sweeps the floor again. Again and again and again. Maybe, she thinks, foolish and sad and desperate, maybe she can erase her presence from this house completely.<p>

"Where's Charles?" Joe asks from the doorway.

"Mister Carson is packing."

"Going back to Grigg?"

"This evening."

"What is it those two do, anyway?"

"Dance. Sing."

And then Joe is laughing and Elsie finds herself laughing too.

"Charles Carson on a stage, never would have guessed." Joe takes her in his arms and she lets him rock her, side to side, slightly. Her hands stay at her sides. "You'll walk him there, then?" Joe's question is sudden, a sharpness to it she's never heard before. "See him off?"

"I suppose I might."

Joe trusts her – she's just not sure _she _does.

* * *

><p>The sun goes down as they walk. Neither say a word, has said a single thing, Blue turns orange turns black and leaves her just as dark, as heavy. She's aware of the emptiness again: the distance from where they stand to the village, from her hand to his. Her house gets smaller, further, but she's no longer sure if Mister Carson is any closer.<p>

They begin down a hill; she can't see the flowers anymore. Can't see a single thing.

"I'm not very unhappy, Mister Carson," she says, hesitant, "you know that, don't you?"

"I'm not very unhappy either."

Silence lapses over them again; she mulls over their words, repeats them over and over again in her mind until they become truths.

"And, besides, if we never knew unhappiness, we'd never know it when happiness wandered in." She has to believe this, otherwise she won't know what to do with her faith.

Or if she has any left at all.

* * *

><p>"He'll be here?"<p>

Charles Carson nods, but doesn't move to open the door.

"What will you do?" She says, as if she doesn't know.

"Go back. I'm responsible for him. I can't run away forever." (In the corners of her memory, a baby cries.)

"No, I don't suppose so. I've never been good at running, meself."

"Me neither."

The door is too close and he is too far.

"You'll write, won't you?"

"If I can. If you'd like."

"I would, Mister Carson. Very much."

The sky is black and her heart is blue and her face is wet, but the air is dry. All of it is meaningless.

They stand there, faces barely visible. Everything is black; everything hurts. She can't see her house, but she can still feel it. She'll never get rid of the feeling, she realizes, never escape it. But she continues to stand there regardless, meeting his eyes but sobbing now, openly and unashamed. She doesn't try to dry her eyes.

She takes both his hands in hers, wills the tremours to stop as she runs her fingers over his palms. Rough, so rough. She tries to remember when they were smooth.

"I told you," she says, voice fractured, "you'd ruin your hands if you stayed here."

And then his hands are gone and the door is open and shut – and she can't feel a thing.

* * *

><p>When she gets home, she goes to Peter's room before anything else. The boy is sleeping soundly, undisturbed. Despite the tears and the mammoth sized gap in her life – the size of a man, of a room, of a walk – she smiles. Her fingers run above his brow, grasp at his tiny hands. The skin is smooth, all of him so soft.<p>

One day, her realization is sudden, his hands, too, will be rough. He'll wear something – laughter or solitude or pride – as armour instead.

She leans into the crib, presses her lips to her boy's forehead.

"You'll be just like your father," she whispers to the shadow of her son, ignoring how her voice still cracks, "I'll make sure of that much."

* * *

><p>She half-expected Joe to be asleep. Is that how it usually is? (Her mind is a mess. Her schedule and timetables collapsing and desperately trying to salvage themselves, reformat. They have to work in the morning. Despite all the new tears and holes, the spaces where she feels broken and raw, it all has to work in the morning. She won't stand for anything less.) But when she crawls under the covers, his hand brushes her arm. Instantly, she's thankful he cant see the dampness of her face. Thankful, too, that her body no longer shakes. He can't know, can't see this from her.<p>

Joe draws her into his arms and she doesn't protest. For once, she wants to be held, the emptiness to stitch itself together, to be filled. His arms meet around her waist and she arches into him, presses herself close.

Tries to squeeze the feelings – and the absence of them – away.

* * *

><p>Joe Burns doesn't move to touch her face. He wonders, briefly, if he's surprised she's home. Mostly, he's just happy. He doesn't touch her face. He doesn't want to know, doesn't need to know. The important part is that she's here.<p>

"I love you," he says. But he doesn't ask her if she loves him. It doesn't matter – not right now.

In the dark, her breaths are short and shallow. He kisses her temple, hugs her tighter. She stays still.

It doesn't matter, not tonight, if she loves him. But there is one question that does:

"Will you be happy?"

Finally, she turns to him. He sees the shadow of her nose, the shine of her eyes, a flash of teeth. When she kisses him, it's fleeting, hesitant.

"I'm learning," she says.

Maybe, he finds himself thinking, that's all that matters.

She falls asleep holding his hands.

* * *

><p><em>And just the epilogue to go. The reviews have be so appreciated, though I'm sorry if this ending is a disappointment. <em>


	7. Epilogue

Peter Burns wakes up in the middle of the night. Passes by the table with his mother's letters. She's a concise writer, but he's always preferred it to his father's rambles. (Or perhaps he just values hers more. As a boy, there was always too much, if possible, of his father and too little of his mother.) And while she'd never confess to a thing, he's learned to read what she leaves out. Her writing slants to the far right when she's concerned, the questions become closer together, constant.

"You should write more," he had told her the last time he had visited. "I like your letters."

As a reply, she had looked him straight in the eye (the sort of look he had feared as a child), "Don't spend your life waiting for someone else to write." She had collected his plate. "It's no way to live."

But she had written him soon after he had left – and her letters were frequent now, prompt.

That was the way he had come to know his mother, know that she cared. She was a woman of habit and repetition. A woman who, he had often joked (though sometimes it held more truth than he'd like to admit), trained herself to love. The way she had read to him every evening as a boy and kissed his father every morning, these were the ways he knew, he counted her love. They were so frequent they became normal and normalcy, she had often told him, was almost as good as the truth. (There was something that would always unsettle him about his mother. A distance created long before he knew the meaning of the word. A part of her was somewhere else, no matter how efficiently she busied herself throughout the day. A part of her was always somewhere else.) Still, if she had trained herself to love, _caring _came naturally. He could see that much every time there was something new in the mail, every time her words fell off their lines.

The letters behind him, he turns the corner.

"I wish you wouldn't cry, Elsie," he whispers, taking the baby girl into his arms. "Your grandmother wasn't, isn't a crier, you know?"

And then he sings, rocks her to sleep:

"_There is a ship and she sails the sea,  
>she's loaded deep as deep can be,<br>but not so deep as the love I'm in,  
>I know not if I sink or swim." <em>

"Yeah," he breathes the words, kisses his daughter's forehead. "It's her favourite song too."

* * *

><p><em>Sorry about the confusion yesterday. Here it is, the epilogue. It was written before the rest of this story, so it's a bit different, but I hope you still enjoy it. As always, your reviews have been so appreciated. <em>


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